What do you do if you’re a professional golfer and your caddie falls ill during a round? If you’re Justin Thomas at the Memorial Tournament, you just have your dad, Mike Thomas, sub in and carry your bag for you for the rest of the day.
Thomas’s original caddie, Jimmy Johnson, complained of dizziness and light-headedness early on in the back nine of Saturday’s round at the Muirfield Village Golf Club, which led to the 27-year-old golfer telling Johnson to go recover:
Jimmy just wasn’t feeling well. He was feeling dizzy. I could tell he was light-headed and just didn’t have a lot of energy. Thomas said. “I told him on 12 that if he needed to leave, he needed to leave. Just to make sure that he’s OK versus both of us worrying about it out there.
On the very next hole, Johnson did just that, and was swiftly replaced by none other than Thomas’s dad, who has stepped in to caddie for his son on multiple occassions before. The elder Thomas also serves as his son’s coach, which meant that he was around to step in when Johnson bailed out. As Golfweek points out, it might have been difficult for Thomas to find a replacement otherwise, as there are no spectators allowed at the Memorial.
Unfortunately for both Thomas men, Justin did not play particularly well after the caddie swap; despite dropping a one-under-par on the front nine, the back nine turned into a hazardous afternoon, with two double-bogeys on the way to a four-over-par that dropped him to 24th place in the tournament with one round to go on Sunday.
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